Tag Archives: Change of seasons

In the midst of all the hectic goings-on, I’ve still found time to marvel at the natural world. Frogs, newts and salamanders, who would love to share our pool but alas, the chlorine is not their friend. A fat garden spider whose neck-high web I inadvertently walked into (like a ligature!), inspiring him/her into defensive mode.

One morning, a delicate mushroom suddenly sprouted in a potted plant and which resembled nothing so much as a paper parasol. While on a walk, a dragon fly lying stunned in the road. Once home, I lay it in a bowl on the porch. The next morning the dragon fly was not there; I soon located it clinging to the inside of the screen and looking quite revived. Taken out of doors, it immediately flew up and away.

At first light, I am often awakened by the song of a robin who has roosted on the same branch outside my bedroom for three summers now and who favors an early morning wake-up call (4:30 am). We have several apple trees—presently bursting with fruit and filled with various tribes of song birds gleaning in a ‘mixed species foraging flock‘. The season’s last butterflies crowd those bushes that are yet in bloom and the cadence of the katydids has slowed considerably with the onset of cooler nights.

Back in June, a smallish snapping turtle spent an entire day depositing eggs at the edge of our yard in a decidedly haphazard pattern; we decided it was her first go at motherhood. Several days ago, David spotted a hatchling and now there are several little turtle-shaped slots in the lawn.

The wild grasses have gone to seed; beautiful swaths of yellow green, mauve and champagne colored froth lining the sides of the road. And now that the temperature has dropped into the forties at night, some of the leaves are beginning to turn as well. Goodbye summer, hello autumn.